“Memory holds together past and present, gives continuity and dignity to human life... the companion... the tutor, the poet, the library, with which you travel.”
“The job of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental people do.”
“When it aims to express a love of the world it refuses to conceal the many reasons why the world is hard to love, though we must love it because we have no other, and to fail to love it is not to exist at all.”
“Though we all know that the survival of the species depends on producing children, up until now we haven't understood how germ cells in the developing embryos decide whether to eventually become the sperm or eggs needed later for adult reproduction. Now we know one way these other cells are talking to germ cells about sex.”